Review: Hollywood Dirt

Hollywood Dirt by Alessandra Torre
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

"That was when you knew you were doing something wrong, when you couldn't look at yourself in the mirror to face it"

Yep. That's definitely when I knew this book was wrong for me. Actually I knew a lot sooner but that sentence sealed the deal.

This is the most disappointing book that I've read so far this year. No, I usually don't read Romance novels, yes I do realize that this is a Romance novel, and an erotic one at that, but you know I believe in giving every genre a chance and every once in a while I crave something in the love department.

I'm pretty disgusted with how Torre portrays women in this book. Despite the unbelievable amount of 4 and 5 star reviews, many reviewers often stated that they were disappointed with how Torre characterizes her Southern characters, especially the female characters, to be nothing more than uneducated, baby-making machines. Not to mention their (totally stereotypical) love for fried chicken and beer.

"Most of our social life revolved around cooking, growing, or eating food. But that was life, especially for a woman, in the South."

Really?! Did that just happen!?

Moving on.

A little backstory about this book: an incredibly hot, world-famous, hot, rich, and did I say hot male actor named Cole Masten descends upon small-town Quincy, Georgia, to make and star in a movie about a bunch of millionaires who made their family fortunes by investing in Coca Cola generations ago. He meets independent, spunky, out-spoken but still southernly-mannered Summer Jenkins, notices her sexy legs, and decides that he wants to bed her right then and there. Oh, I should also mention that both parties have been badly burned by cheating ex's, and that Summer committed some sort of terrible act of revenge upon her ex-fiance that is repeatedly hinted at throughout the entire book but when finally revealed fails to live up to the hype and secrecy.

Infatuated at first sight with Summer, Cole casts her in his movie opposite him as his leading lady so he can charm and woo her to his bed - because he's Cole Masten and he gets what he wants. Summer is not impressed with Cole as a human being, but because she needs the money and apparently wants out of small-town Quincy, she accepts.

Of course a Romance novel wouldn't be a Romance novel without a little sparring to generate some sexual tension, am I right? We've already established that Cole finds Summer attractive enough to employ her in the hopes of getting some action on the side, but her strong, 'southern woman' personality (a.k.a she stands up for herself) is more than he's used to handling back in Hollywood where women literally drool at his feet. Summer finds Cole instantaneously and irresistibly hot - so hot in fact that she can hardly look at him or form sentences, but (not surprisingly) completely loathes his personality so thoroughly that we really wonder if these two will ever end up in bed together (they do).

Now really, this love-hate-love story-line has been done before and is not entirely the reason why I dislike the book. What really set me off is the incredibly demeaning way that all the men treat Summer. Other than Summer, there is a decided lack of females in the story save for her mother, who doesn't play a significant role. I know part of the reason stems from Summer's aforementioned 'revenge plot' that renders her a social pariah in town, leaving Summer to deal with the group of Hollywood-misogynistic-creepy men by herself.

No one has her back when Cole, angry with Summer for shunning his advances after their first sexual encounter, decides to change the original script to include first a kissing scene, and then later on a sex scene between the two of them, complete with Summer needing to appear naked on camera - something she never agreed to and "fought tooth and nail" over, but to no avail.

Cole - "You have to do it. You signed a contract."
Summer - "The contract didn't say anything about me being naked on camera."
Cole - "Correction. The contract didn't say anything about you not being naked on camera."

Chapters 83 and 84 (which includes the above passage) really got to me. I'm not entirely sure where Torre is trying to go with this story at this point because these chapters, to me, read as though Cole is basically forcing Summer into doing soft-core porn, and other than the spineless director objecting a few times, no one else stands up to Cole or supports Summer in not wanting to film a sex scene. It is even mentioned that Cole's script changes make absolutely no sense to the continuity of the movie. Regardless, Cole tells Summer to "man up" and "be a professional about it" - two ridiculous statements because first of all she's a woman, not a man, and second of all she is not a professional actor but an amateur, someone Cole plucked out of nowhere.

I've had a hard time articulating why I'm uncomfortable with this part of the story because up until the last 20% of the book - when Cole coerces Summer into (fake) sex for money - it wasn't such a bad read, albeit a cheesy read.

Basically, it feels like Torre takes a serious subject, men using their masculinity and status to force women to do things they don't want to do for money or other rewards, and makes it seem like no big deal. I say this because despite the fact that Summer strategically maneuvers herself out of doing the sex scene, she doesn't retain any dignity in my eyes because she still wants Cole's smokin' hot bod anyway. Why did Torre write her like that? What is her motivation for making Summer so...hypocritical...in her actions?

Cole treats Summer and everyone else like the big jerk that he is, and yet she still falls in love with him and constantly stares at his 'package' and fantasizes about his naked body. It's as though, simply because he's a hot, famous actor, she forgets herself. And just because Cole's been cheated on in the past, he can treat everyone in his life terribly. To be fair I'll add here that Summer is not entirely blameless, as they are both pretty immature in how they handle their weird non-relationship, fighting and bickering and not communicating like the adults they are.

In the end neither one of them go through any kind of major growth or realization about themselves, they just 'get together' and have a baby and live happily ever after. I wanted to feel sympathy for Summer for what she went through with Cole, and vice versa, but really the two of them are so frustrating in their ignorance that they pretty much deserve each other.

Sorry but...I just don't buy it. I would never let a man treat me the way Cole treats Summer. He makes her cry repeatedly, feel inferior, ashamed for standing up for herself, and used. But she still goes for him in the end.

And yes I know it's just a story, a totally hypothetical, erotic story, but stories have the power to shape and reflect our realities, which is why I'm shocked that so many women gave this book such rave reviews. Is this how women want to be treated by men? Dominated and bullied? And is this how women act towards those men? Flippant and wishy-washy? How romantic.

I guess I should try to stay away from these kind of Romance novels, hey?


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